Indian postal workers strike against privatisation in Kerala state

About 25,000 postal workers walked off the job in India’s southern Kerala state, demanding a stop to what they called the government’s privatisation efforts.

“We will all be jobless soon if the government privatizes postal services,” M. Krishnan, of the National Federation of Postal Employees, told The Associated Press.

He said mail moved by train was also affected as employees of the Railway Mail Service had joined the strike.

The Department of Posts recently awarded a contract to eight courier companies in Kerala to deliver “Speed Post.” Customers can now use Speed Post services in the state’s post offices to deliver mail in three days.

Talks between the striking employees’ unions and the state government failed Tuesday.

“The unions did not agree to our promise that we would look into their complaints and sort out their issues,” said M.S. Ramanujam, a postmaster-general in Kerala.

He said assigning some services to private companies was not “part of any privatization move.”

“We have done this to increase the efficiency of this particular service, and there is nothing illegal about it,” he said.

The strike will continue until the government abandons the privatization program, said the Joint Council of Associations of Employees of the Department of Posts.